Sunday, January 05, 2014

On one level it was not quite the worst week of the season
for the Washington Capitals.On another,
Week 14 was just that, and as we reached the half-way point of the 28-week
season, that is not a good thing.

Record: 0-2-2

It was the first losing week for the Caps since Week 8 and
only their second since Week 2.They
were saving it up, apparently.The
four-game losing streak matched the Caps’ longest of the 2013-2014 season
(November 20 – 27, 0-3-1).One might try
to explain this away as being the product of three of the games being played on
the road, but this highlights a concern.Nine of the 13 games to close January will be played on the road.

When the week began the Caps sat in second place in the Metropolitan
Division with 44 points, six points ahead of four teams tied at 38 points
(Philadelphia, New York Rangers, Columbus, New Jersey).By week’s end, that lead over the pack was
gone, the Flyers having overtaken the Caps for second place (based on more
wins; they teams are tied with 46 points apiece), and the Caps are only six
points ahead of seventh-place Columbus in The Metro.

Offense:2.00/game
(season: 2.86 / rank: 9th)

When the offense only registers eight goals in four games,
it makes for a thin week for individual scoring.What jumps off the page (well, given the Caps
play it is more as if what oozes off the page) is that half of the goals for
the week were scored by Mike Green, who had his first two-goal game of the
season against the Minnesota Wild, and Troy Brouwer, who doubled his goal
output recorded over the 21 games preceding this week.Making it a stranger week, Marcus Johansson
led the club in points (1-2-3).Recording points in consecutive games to end the week broke a five-game
streak without a point after he had a five-game points streak.Maybe it’s a trend.

On the one hand, one might like that six different players
shared the goals and 14 players recorded points.On the other hand, it was only eight goals
for the week.If you look at the club at
5-on-5 it was a case of inverse sliding scales.The shots on goal for the week at 5-on-5 went 35, 29, 38, 21.The flip side of that was that the shooting
percentages went up through the week: 2.9, 3.4, 7.9, 9.5.Shooting percentages go up, shots go down.That’s how you get to an eight-goal week
(seven at 5-on-5).

Defense: 3.25/game (season: 2.95 / rank: 24th)

One cannot like the progression of goals allowed through the
week… one, three, four, five.The odd
part is that twice the Caps held opponents to fewer than 20 shots (17 for
Buffalo in a 2-1 Gimmick loss to the Sabres, 11 in a 5-3 loss to the Minnesota
Wild).It was the first time this season
the Caps held an opponent to fewer than 20 shots.In fact, it was the first time the Caps held
an opponent to fewer than 20 shots since January 3, 2012, a 3-1 Caps win that Caps
fans will remember as the night Rene Bourque concussed Nicklas Backstrom.

It was the first time that the Caps held two opponents under
20 shots in the span of a week since turning the trick against Edmonton (19
shots) and Anaheim (15 shots) on October 27 – November 1, 2011. Oddly enough,
the Caps lost to Edmonton and had to score two goals late to force overtime
against the Ducks before winning, 5-4 (the night Alex Ovechkin was benched in
the last minute of regulation).

On the possession side, what a week.At 5-on-5 overall the Caps had an aggregate
59.9 Corsi-for percentage, a 59.2 Fenwick-for percentage.They held opponents to 80 shots at 5-on-5
while getting 123 of their own. It is not a perfect indicator of success.

A tale of two goalies.Philipp Grubauer had three starts for the week and played respectably –
2.30 goals against average and a .920 save percentage.But look more closely.One goal allowed, then two goals, then four
goals.It was the culmination of a
stretch in which Grubauer appeared in ten of the last 13 games, not really a
part of the plan when the season started.He finished that run going 1-2-2 in his last five appearances after
going 4-0-1 in the first five appearances.

All in all, it has been a very good performance by Grubauer,
but at some point the guy you think was, is, and will be your number one goalie
has to get work.That guy – Braden Holtby
– had not appeared in a game since December 21st before taking the
ice on Saturday against the Minnesota Wild to end the week.It did not go well.Five goals allowed on 11 shots. It was the
third straight appearance in which Holtby allowed five goals, and in the appearance
just before that he allowed three goals on eight shots in 11 minutes of work
before being relieved.Just 73 saves on
91 shots in four appearances, a .802 save percentage.

But not all of what happened on Saturday can be laid at the
pads of Braden Holtby.The Caps allowed
the Wild entirely too much latitude to set up in front of their netminder,
particularly Dany Heatley doing so twice on what would be power play goals by
Ryan Suter.The only one of the five
goals that Holtby might conceivably have wanted back was Suter’s third goal of
the contest, scored as Suter exited the penalty box and joined on a 2-on-1
rush, the shot sailing over Holtby’s blocker.

With 40 games to go in the season, goaltending is at
something of a crossroads.It is getting
to be time for the Caps to realize that Michal Neuvirth has been accumulating
rust since before Thanksgiving and might very well be useless to them for the
rest of this season, if they do not trade him before that.Grubauer is too green and might be in danger
of being overworked, as much for the mental grind of playing at this level as
the physical grind of getting so much work.Holtby is the number one goalie, and he needs to play, to play himself
out of his doldrums and to show him that the Caps think – that they know – that
he is the guy.

Power Play: 1-7 / 14.3 percent (season: 25.3 percent / rank:
2nd)

As the power play goes, so go the Caps.That has been the season to date.In eight of the previous 13
weeks the Caps were at least 20 percent on the power play and won five of those
weeks, breaking even in two others.They
did not clear that threshold this week, leaving them 3-3 in weeks in which they
do not hit that 20 percent power play mark.

This week the Caps were 1-for-7 in four games.What doesn’t work in that math is seven power
plays in four games.They had no more
than two man advantages in any of the games, making it six times in nine games
they had two or fewer power plays.In a
way they played in bad luck.You get 20
shots in 13:25 of total power play time, you are getting your chances.But one goal on those 20 shots?A 5.0 shooting percentage?It is not what one would expect from this
team.It was not as if the team got
their shots from players who should not be shooting, either.Eight shots on goal from Alex Ovechkin (no
goals), six combined from Troy Brouwer and Joel Ward in the middle of the 1-3-1
(no goals).The only goal was a rebound
off an Alex Ovechkin shot potted by Marcus Johansson.

Once upon a time this season the Caps killed off 34
shorthanded situations in a row.Since
then the penalty kill has relentlessly descended into a pit of despair.In the nine weeks since hitting their
high-water mark of 90.7 percent on the penalty kill, their season PK percentage
dropped eight times until they now sit at 80.5 percent, 21st in the
league.

This week they were not uniformly awful.In the first three games of the week the Caps
were 7-for-8, allowing only one goal on 13 shots in 14:38 of penalty killing
time.Then came the debacle against
Minnesota in the last game of the week.It wasn’t the shots – the Wild had three in 6:40 of power play
time.It was that the Wild scored on
each of them.Two of them came from Ryan
Suter, contributing to his first career hat trick and first career two-power
play goal game.He is also now the first Wild defenseman ever to score power play goals within a minute of one another. In both instances he
benefitted from Dany Heatley setting up comfortable as you please at the top of
the crease with his backside in goalie Braden Holtby’s face, denying the goalie
any sight lines.The other power play
goal – the game-winning goal – came off the stick of Jason Zucker, who slammed
the puck in from the goal mouth after a point shot from Jonas Brodin hit bodies
in front.The Wild had more effective
screens in this game than Home Depot sells to people repairing their windows.

Lost the week, lost the week.The Caps continue to struggle at even
strength.The novel part of this week’s
struggle was not in teams outshooting or outpossessing them.The Caps outshot opponents by a 135-83 margin
at even strength.Still, they were
outscored.Bad luck?Bad karma?Does it matter?Here are some
things to chew on.Marcus Johansson does
not have an even strength goal since November 7th.Nicklas Backstrom has two even strength goals
in his last 15 games.Troy Brouwer has
two in his last 13 games.The Caps rank
just 18th in the league in 5-on-5 goals.They have allowed the ninth-most such
goals.This week was one in a stream of frustration.

Faceoffs: 128-261 / 49.0 percent (season: 49.7 percent /
rank: 16th)

It was pretty much an even week overall, but by zone it was
a much better week for the Caps in the offensive end (53.8 percent than it was
in the defensive end (47.3 percent) or in the neutral zone (44.6 percent).Nicklas Backstrom had a good week in the offensive
end (17-for-28; 60.7 percent), but he was under 50 percent in the other two
zones (48.0 percent in the defensive end, 40.7 percent in the neutral
zone).Only Mikhail Grabvovski (58.8
percent ) and Jay Beagle (71.4 percent on seven draws) were over 50 percent in
the defensive end.

Goals For/Against by Period:

The second period has been kind to the Caps so far this
season.Not so in Week 14.The Caps were outscored by an 8-4 margin for
the week.Worse, they twice gave up
leads in the second periods of games (to Carolina and Minnesota) accounting for
six of the eight goals allowed.The Caps
did not finish games strong on offense, either.One third period goal, that one scored against the woeful Buffalo Sabres
in the first game of the week.They did
not give up a lot – two goals – but in a week with no wins, it was not good
enough.

In the end…

There are 40 games left, and the Caps are a mess at the
moment.Goaltending is a mess… the
number one goalie has had his confidence cracked, another has almost as much
rust on him as the Titanic, and a third should be learning his craft in
Hershey, not being burned out in Washington.The Caps still go as far as their power play takes them, they are still
a penalty killing team in decline.Once
solidly in second place in the Metropolitan Division, the mirage that their
standing was has vanished.The Caps are
not a good even strength team, don’t win when either their power play struggles
or the teams don’t go to the Gimmick to settle things, they dictate neither
pace nor style of play.From game to
game one does not know if this team will show up, let alone know what style
they wish to employ.Coaches seem to
have no answers, the front office seems to be either patient to a fault or
somnambulant.It is a team poorly
constructed and, at the moment at least, poorly managed.

Did we miss anything?We hope not, because with 40 games left there is time to address
problems.The question is, do they –
from the equipment managers to the top of the food chain – know how?

The Washington Capitals played what might have been their
best opening 20 minutes of the season at Xcel Energy Center in Minneapolis
tonight, but there being 60 minutes in a hockey game, they still lost, 5-3, to
the Minnesota Wild.

It sure looked good early.Marcus Johansson got the Caps off to a good start with a power play goal
eight minutes into the game as he put back a rebound of an Alex Ovechkin shot
attempt.Just 13 seconds later, Mike
Green put the Caps up, 2-0, when he took a pass in stride from Jason Chimera
just inside the blue line, left Matt Cooke standing by the side of the road as
he curled and dragged the puck around him, then wristed the puck over the left
pad of goalie Niklas Backstrom.

Then, this happened…

Nino Niederreiter halved the Caps lead on just the second
shot of the game for the Wild 2:16 into the second period when he jumped into
the slot as the trailer, taking a pass from Charlie Coyle, and snapping the
puck over the glove of goalie Braden Holtby.

Less than five minutes (and just two shots) later, the Wild
tied it on a 5-on-3 power play, Ryan Suter flinging a shot from high in the
zone through a screen and past Holtby.On the back half of that power play, it was Suter again, sending a hope
and a prayer from the same spot on the ice through the legs of defenseman John
Carlson, past Holtby’s left pad, and into the back of the net to give the Wild
the lead, 3-2

Six minutes later Mike Green got his second of the game on
the oddest of plays.Mike Green sent a
floater into the air and off the end boards behind and to the left of
Backstrom.The puck rebounded back, hit
Backstrom’s glove, made a right turn, his Backstrom’s right pad, and caromed in
to make it 3-3.

Barely three minutes later, though, Minnesota took the lead
for good on another power play.Jonas
Brodin sent a soft shot toward the net from the left point that hit a skate,
popped up into the air, and dropped behind Holtby where Jason Zucker swatted it
in from the last 12 inches.

That ended a bizarre nightmare of a period for the Caps, who
allowed four goals on eight shots.The
third period didn’t go any worse for the Caps, but it hardly went better.With Ryan Suter off on a tripping call 5:30
into the period, the Caps had a chance to get back into it.The Caps managed just one shot on goal, and
as Suter left the penalty box after the Wild killed the penalty he jumped up
with Clayton Stoner to press a 2-on-1 rush with Mike Green back.Green defended neither the pass nor a shot,
and Stoner found Suter for a one timer for the hat trick and the final 5-3
margin.

Other stuff…

-- The first period:

Score: Caps 2 – Wild 0

Shots: Caps 11 – Wild 1

Shot Attempts:Caps 18 – Wild 6

Faceoffs: Caps 14 – Wild 6

-- Second period

Score: Wild 4 – Caps 1

Shots: Wild 8 – Caps 10

Shot Attempts: Wild 12 – Caps 21

Faceoffs: Wild 18 – Caps 5

-- Since 1995, when the Caps lost a 3-2 decision to the
Florida Panthers, 11 teams allowed 11 shots or fewer in a game and lost.Five of the losing teams were shutout,
another four scored just one goal.The
Caps are the 12th team since then to allow 11 shots in a game and
lose, the first to allow more than three goals in doing it.

-- There will be a lot of talk about Braden Holtby allowing
five goals on 11 shots.That goes with
the territory.But really, this team
plays entirely too dainty a game on the penalty kill.Defensemen are little more than maître d’s
showing forwards to the top of the crease… ah, your table is waiting, Monsieur.Watch Braden Holtby trying to get a sight
line around Dany Heatley to his left and Ryan Suter shooting the puck through
the other side.

-- The Caps were 2-for-5 on penalty kills.That makes 23-for-33 over their last nine
games (69.7 percent).Remember when they
killed 34 in a row earlier this season?Yeah, me neither.

-- The Caps had two even strength goals on 24 shots, the
Wild two even strength goals on eight shots.Yeah, that means the Wild took three power play shots…and scored on all
of them.The Wild did not get their
tenth shot of the game until the 47:38 mark of the contest.They scored on it (Suter’s hat trick goal).

-- Mikhail Grabovski had a jersey malfunction, his name
plate spelling “GRABOVSKY.”We’re
thinking it was not a mistake, but an omen… “’Y’,’ oh ‘Y’ are you playing like
this?”

-- The loss makes the Caps 0-6-1 in franchise history in
games played in Minnesota against the Wild.The last time the Caps won a game against any NHL team in
Minnesota?February 9, 1993, against the
North Stars.Dale Hunter had a pair of
goals, Dmitri Khristich potted another, and Don Beaupre stopped 19 of 21 shots
in a 3-2 win.

-- Passive hockey… In six of their last nine games the Caps
have had two or fewer power plays.They
had two against the Wild, converting one of them.

-- You could almost see the writing on the wall early on in
this, despite what looked like a hot start.Their first six shots came from 50, 57, 38, 25, 62, and 41 feet out
(according to the play-by-play summary at NHL.com).The Caps offense was a rebound on a power
play, a sick individual piece of skating, and a weird bounce.Nowhere in there do you see sustained pressure.

-- Ryan Suter had a hat trick, his first in the NHL.He didn’t have so much as a two-goal game
since October 22, 2009, 315 games ago.It was the first time in his career he recorded two power play goals in
a game.They were his first power play
goals of the season.

-- For the Wild it was the first time they recorded three
power play goals in a game since December 10, 2011, 144 games ago.

-- Equal opportunity defense… 14 of the 18 skaters for the
Caps were on ice for at least one Minnesota goal.Eric Fehr, Karl Alzner, Marcus Johansson, and
Tom Wilson were the four to escape that ignominy.

-- Speaking of Wilson… 3:46 in ice time.How little is that?Technically, Alex Ovechkin had a shift of
3:09 in this game.

-- Not one, but two delay-of-game penalties, shooting the
puck over the glass.Karl Alzner’s was
especially egregious, as he had time and space to do something – anything –
else with the puck than lifting it over the glass.That put the Caps two men down, and the rest
was history.

-- Three Wild players scored goals on all the shots they
took.There was Suter’s three-for-three,
of course, but Jason Zucker and Nino Niederreiter scored on their only
respective shots of the game.

-- Maybe it was just coincidence, but after Matt Cooke and
Alex Ovechkin had a staredown in front of the players bench with 31 seconds
left in the first period, the Wild outscored the Caps, 5-1.Yeah, the penalty killing had something to do
with it, too.

-- Weird stat… Nicklas Backstrom was 5-for-15 on draws for
the game, but he was 5-for-7 in the ends.

-- Speaking of Backstrom, this was just the third time in
the last 16 games Backstrom and Ovechkin each registered a point that the Caps
lost (13-2-1).It is the second loss in
a row and third in four games (1-2-1).

-- Braden Holtby’s save percentage over his last six
appearances… .840.

In the end…

Here is the scary part.Let’s compare two teams in a slump…

They look similar don’t they?Team B is the current Caps on their 1-3-3
slide over their last seven games.Team
A is the Caps of 2011-2012, the last seven games before Bruce Boudreau was
relieved of his duties as head coach.

And the optics look just as bad. It is a team that has
played listlessly, without any sense of urgency.They have been soft, letting teams largely
work without much resistance in the Capitals’ zone and letting teams push them
around in the Capitals’ attack zone.Frankly, as hockey teams go, they're soft, entirely too easy to play against. The
coaching staff seems not to have any answers.It is almost as if things are the way Karl Alzner described them…

"For whatever reason, as a team we weren't really
responding well enough or as good as we should have been.And it's kind of, 'Where do you go from
there?'"

The trouble is, Alzner said that in the wake of Boudreau’s firing in 2011.At the moment we are left to wonder where the
Caps are going from here. Other than sliding into third place in the Metropolitan Division with tonight's loss, that is. They have four days off to figure it out before taking on a Tampa Bay team that is, at the moment, everything the Caps are not -- overachieving, dynamic, on their game.

The other stuff

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